May 3-9, 2025
SATURDAY 3
📌 Prince Harry has done an interview to repeat his belief that the British taxpayer should foot the police-protection bill whenever he decides to set foot on these shores again. His father, the King of England, has seemingly told him to sod off and refuses to talk to him. I’m kinda with the King on this one.
📌 A Crystal Palace player, Eberechi Eze, has become a chess champion.
SUNDAY 4 David Sedaris is not a fan of AI. Or more precisely he is not a fan of AI voices replacing real ones, or of AI authors replacing proper writers. If David Sedaris were about 10 years younger I could predict him waxing fancifully on how AI got him the best hotel room on his book tour, or how it successfully regulated the medication intake of a declining parent.
📌 In his first term as president of the United States, Donald Trump is reported to have told 30,573 lies.
📌 Rory Stewart and Alastair Campbell on their The Rest Is Politics podcast are noticing a global swing towards China over the US.
MONDAY 5 Someone in the Green Party wants to take over the leadership and make them the antidote to Nigel Farage and Reform UK. Good luck with that. “Eco-Populism” might just be the match that sets fire to the arses of today’s youth.
TUESDAY 6 The man in the Nationwide must have thought I was proper dozy, not knowing which ISAs are which and where all the best interest lies these days. Good job my wife does know all that stuff, or I’d be stuffed. Surprisingly, the Nationwide man said they liked it when real people turned up to talk to them.
📌 The Sashiko stitch workshop I’d been planning with Harshita went off remarkably well. One person dropped out an hour before it was due to start, so I was quite angry about that. But very soon I settled into enjoying what for me should never have been enjoyable, namely a very disciplined, rules-based stitchwork that offers no scope for freeform expression.
WEDNESDAY 7 At last, it is official, I am decrepit.
Dear Mr Mann,
Your hip xray has shown quite significant osteoarthritis. I suspect when you saw me you were going through a flare. Could you make a routine appointment to discuss this further
many thanks,
Dr B.R. John
The Neaman Practice
📌 The Barbican’s new sculpture gallery pairs Alberto Giacometti and Huma Bhabha in what looks like two separate but conjoined forms of modern. Giacometti’s sculptures do often look like the main feature of a cold-case forensic investigation, whereas Bhabha’s look like what a Giacometti student does as a dissertation project.
THURSDAY 8
📌 At the James Freeman gallery on Upper Street we got to study some dark visions inspired by the Medieval. Some of them were fascinating but disturbing in equal measure. Others, such as the ceramics of Dutch sculptor Carolein Smit, were strikingly gothic but nevertheless exquisite to look at.
FRIDAY 9 Chess Boxing. Yes, it’s a thing. Wiki offers some enlightenment: “Two combatants play alternating rounds of blitz chess and boxing until one wins by checkmate or knockout.”
📌 One day in the studio Sandra did a drawing of a weird dancing man but didn’t like it. Alex thought it might make a good lino cut and knocked off a few prints for last year’s Printfest. Then she tried printing it onto calico but didn’t like it because some of the ink smudged around the dancer’s groin. She threw it in the bin, which is where I found it and decided to add stitch. Then I lost it, but found it recently. It still looks a bit grubby, but who cares? Sandra loves it.
📌 An item in The Knowledge states that cat ownership among 18-to-34-year-olds has risen “dramatically” in recent years, with 41% of Gen Z owning one, meaning cats will outnumber dogs within two years. Apparently, the trend is driven by celebrity feline fans such as Taylor Swift and Bob Mortimer.
📌 There’s a growing queue of commentators lining up to say the “landmark” trade deal Keir Starmer and Peter Mandelson have done with Donald Trump is really not that great after all.
📌 A pair of stupid vandals went on the rampage and chopped down a tree deemed to be sacred because of its situation in a picturesque valley that looked good at sunset. The stupid vandals are now being depicted in the media as if they were child killers.
📌 While the rest of the world is still trying to make up its mind about the new Pope, Leo XIV, the Guardian seems convinced that the progressive reforms started by his predecessor Pope Francis will continue.
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